The sergeant let out a long sigh. “Too bad we don’t have enough of a description to put a bulletin out on this guy.”
Templeton didn’t reply.
“Yeah,” Miranda said to fill the silence.
Demarco studied the toothpick in his hand as if it held the answers to the universe. Finally he said, “Oh, Steele.”
Miranda felt her stomach twinge. “Yes, Sergeant?”
“Your husband called this afternoon.”
She knew it. “And?”
The sergeant’s gaze drifted to the corner, as if he were searching for an escape hatch there. “He had another interview. It’s out of town so he won’t be back till late tonight. He wanted me to tell you.”
She just bet he did. Fury rose up her spine and into her head, tempting her mouth to open in a barrage of cussing. But it wouldn’t be smart to go off on Demarco. He was just the messenger.
Instead she grinned at him. “Did he say exactly where the interview was, Sergeant?” Maybe she’d go pay him a visit.
Demarco rolled back on his heels. “Out of state. Florida, actually.” He cleared his throat and rolled his toothpick between his fingers.
Florida? What the hell was Parker doing in Florida?
Her grin grew tighter. “Okay. Thanks.”
Demarco looked at her as if he could read her mind. And Miranda could see he was damned uncomfortable lying for Parker—again. Florida? It had to be something big for Parker to go so far.
That thought was less than comforting.
Demarco cleared his throat. “Well, let me know if you get anything.”
“Will do, sir,” Templeton said. And Miranda half expected her to salute.
The sergeant scanned the two investigators once more, stuffed the toothpick back into his mouth and headed back down the aisle of evidence.
When she heard the outer door clang shut, Miranda turned to Templeton. “You don’t want to let this case go, do you?”
“Not yet. I’ve got an idea.”
Miranda took a breath, hoping it was a good one. “I’m all ears.”
“The old Tannenburg house.”
“What about it?”
Templeton pointed at her. “You said it yourself a few minutes ago. What if there’s something there? You know, buried under the rubble?”
Miranda had been babbling out loud, grasping at straws. She hadn’t really believed it herself. “After fourteen years of Chicago winters? It would take an archeological team to find something there.”
Templeton had a silly grin on her face. “How about a sniffer?”
“A what?”
“A police dog trained to hunt scents.”
Miranda frowned not daring to jump at the idea. “And how do we get one of those?”
Templeton scooted up in her chair and gave Miranda a wink. “I know a guy on the K9 unit. He might do us a favor.”
“A guy?”
“An officer.”
“What officer?”
Templeton winced. “Okay. We’re sort of dating. His name’s Gary O’Malley. He’s Irish. He’s nice.”
Templeton was making her head spin. She was dating a guy in the K9 unit? Miranda thought about what that might mean, fighting back her rising hopes.
She held up a hand. “Wait. Doesn’t a dog like that need a scent to work from? We don’t have anything of Tannenburg’s.”
Templeton’s grin got wider. “We have Lydia Sutherland’s hair.”
They did. Right there in the evidence box at their feet. And it had been kept in cold storage all these years. But the Tannenburg property had not.
She shook her head. “There’s not going to be anything on that place with her scent still on it.”
Templeton lifted a shoulder. “I’ve heard stranger stories from Gary.”
What if it could happen? What if the odds suddenly turned in their favor and they actually found something? “And if Lydia Sutherland’s scent is still somewhere on the Tannenburg estate?”
The detective grinned. “We’d have the proof we need.”
Along with everything else, it would be the nail in the boyfriend’s coffin. “But we still don’t have Tannenburg.”
Templeton lifted a shoulder. “Can’t have everything.”
Miranda scowled at that. “Not much good if we can’t get a killer off the streets.”
“But even so, if we find something pointing to Lydia or to arson by the son the DA would have to accept the case and it would be up to the Federal Marshalls to find him.”
“Maybe.” Miranda hated not getting her man.
And going up to Evanston with a police dog to hunt for something that might not be there was another long shot. She rubbed her eyes suddenly feeling bone tired.
“You look beat,” Templeton said.
“I had a rough night.” Miranda remembered Parker telling her she’d kicked at him all night. Maybe that was why he went out of town—to get some descent sleep.
“Let me give Gary a call.”
Templeton took her phone and stepped between the aisles while Miranda tidied up the work area.
After a few minutes the detective returned. “We’re in luck. Sort of. Gary and his partner are available, but not until nine tonight.”
His partner? Must mean the dog. “What do we do till then?”
Templeton glanced at the time on her phone. “I’ve got to check on my kid and make sure my mother can watch him tonight. Why don’t I drop you back at the hotel and pick you up in a few hours?”
Oh, yeah. She didn’t have a ride. Not very gentlemanly of Parker. He’d never leave her stranded. That meant he’d gone on the spur of the moment, and it wasn’t a planned interview. She wondered what he’d learned.
“Sure,” she told Templeton.
She got up, grabbed her briefcase and followed Templeton back out to the lot. Feeling wearier than ever and a little bit deserted, she climbed into the SUV.
Hah, she thought as she closed the door. Who needed Parker and his fancy rented Audi when you had a police vehicle handy?
Chapter Forty-Seven
Miranda lay on the freshly made bed in her fancy hotel suite and stared up at the ceiling. It felt weird without Parker here. She certainly would never book a place like this on her own. If she’d come here on her own, she would have gotten a cheap one room deal with a shared bathroom.
Where the hell was he?
She rolled over and pounded the pillow with her fist, wishing it was his face. No, she’d never hurt that work of art. But the vision of her handsome husband with his sexy grin and gunmetal eyes made her even madder at him.
Why wasn’t he here working this case? What was so important he had to run off to Florida of all places?
And then she knew.
It had to be those text messages on her phone. He’d discovered them and was hunting down whoever had sent them.
But why Chicago? Why Florida?
She didn’t want to know. Her thoughts started to race. How had he found those messages? Had Becker slipped up about her secret? Had they been working together? What in the world had they discovered? Those texts messages had to be a prank. Someone who’d seen her on TV and decided to play a joke. Someone looking for kicks. Probably some pimply faced teen with a bad attitude.
Right?
It was no good trying to figure it out. Her brain was too tired from trying to figure out where Adam Tannenburg was.
She shoved her head onto the pillow, forced her eyes to shut. Her mind kept racing but her thoughts didn’t make much sense.
She had a vision of Parker in Florida chasing a chubby ten-year-old through an orange grove. The kid kept tossing fruit at him, but he dodged every one. At last the vision faded into a tangerine colored mist and she fell asleep.
###
She didn’t know how long she’d been out when she woke with a start, heart pounding in her chest and ears.
Something was wrong. Very wrong. She could feel it.
She ran into the livi
ng room where the chocolate colored furniture sat. She could hear it now. A loud rattling.
She spun around and glared at the doorknob.
It twisted left, then right.
He was here. Right here. He was coming in.
The door crashed open.
Screaming she turned and bolted across the floor, knocking over a kitchen chair as she went. Heart banging like a jackhammer, she raced into the next room. It was dark in here. Pitch black. But she felt along the wall and found another door.
Hurry, she thought. He’s coming. She could hear him breathing behind her.
She threw open the door and stepped onto the cold concrete of a dark hall. There was a staircase. She started up it as fast as she could. It, too, was cold against her feet. She could feel the perforations of the slip guards.
She ignored the sensation and tried to take two steps at a time but her ratty old robe got in the way. Halfway up the steps she tripped. The stairs scraped at her knees. Pain shot through her flesh. Before she could get to her feet again hands began groping for her from behind. She tried to beat them away but her blows were so weak.
One of the hands grabbed her hair and dragged her back down the stairs.
“I’ve got you now.” The voice was raw as gravel. She knew it only too well.
He hovered over her, his long oily hair hanging over his face, the ends of it dangling against her cheeks, the slits of his dark eyes as mean as ever.
“I should never have let you live. I won’t now.” He raised a tight heavy fist.
As it came at her she twisted, trying to turn away but the blow struck hard against her jaw. Pain lasered through her face, her skull.
She tasted blood in her mouth.
She screamed. She kicked. Straining against the concrete she tried to crawl away from him. She didn’t get an inch. She began to cry and plead like a lost child.
“Let me go,” she bawled. “Please, stop. You’re hurting me.”
“You’re going to hurt a lot worse when I get done with you. It’s what whores like you deserve.”
A whore. He’d always thought she was a whore no matter what she did, no matter how hard she tried to please him.
But she wasn’t. She wasn’t then. She wasn’t now.
She was a fighter.
Somehow she managed to pull herself up. She was tall now. Taller than he was. She raised her fists and dared to stare him down.
But his black eyes flashed with mockery.
This moment wouldn’t last long. She needed to move now. If she didn’t it would be too late.
She turned and struck out with her foot. A perfect roundhouse kick. But where was the smack?
Instead, he grabbed her ankle and they tumbled backward toward the staircase. They tottered one way. Then the other. She reached out for the railing, felt the cold metal slip through her fingers.
And then they were falling.
Down and down and down. Tumbling over and over each other. Spinning round and round and round.
They would reached the bottom soon. Her head would split open and it would be the end. They would find her in a pool of blood.
She couldn’t let it happen.
Madly she reached out for something, anything to stop the fall. There was nothing but air.
She was going to die.
Her mouth opened wide. Her breath caught hard in her throat. She could hear herself scream.
“Nooooo!”
And then she was awake.
Chest heaving Miranda bolted up on the bed. The sheets were a twisted mass around her legs. Heart still pounding she struggled out of them and wriggled to the side of the bed. She sat there a moment, shaking all over.
Dear Lord, these dreams!
Why was she still having them? She’d thought they were over after Lake Placid. She’d gone for months without one. And then they’d come back. She had the first one when she and Parker were in Las Vegas.
And this one, she remembered as her head cleared, was so like the one she’d had a day ago. Trapped in a stairwell with Leon raping her. Trying to get away and tumbling down the stairs into oblivion.
What did it mean? She’d leave that question for Dr. Wingate.
She rubbed her arms and looked around the empty room. She’d feel better if she had a gun but she didn’t even have her baseball bat here. She wished Parker were here, but no, he had gone off to Florida.
She spied her cell phone on the nightstand. Maybe she should call Dr. Wingate now. Was she in her office? Then she looked at the clock.
Seventy-thirty. At night.
She rubbed her face. She was supposed to go to Evanston with Templeton tonight.
Getting to her feet she tried to shake off the nerves. She needed to get a shower and something to eat before the detective came to pick her up.
She decided to call room service and ordered a steak.
She headed for the bathroom and made sure she locked the door behind her. As she stripped off and got under the water, she hoped her food order would get here soon.
She wasn’t hungry, but she really wanted that steak knife.
Chapter Forty-Eight
Parker landed at Palm Beach International Airport at five fifty-eight p.m.
He rented a car and drove north with the sun on his shoulder to the small retirement community outside Jupiter where former corrections officer Felix Wolak lived.
The officer’s home was whitewashed stucco with a trim lawn and a fanciful white fence of the same material as the house. A cozy place to spend your last good years, Parker thought as he pulled into the driveway and got out of the car.
Something deep inside him yearned for a place like this with Miranda. But it was best not to think about that now.
He knocked on the door and heard a woman call out, “Just a minute.”
He recognized the soft southern accent he’d heard on the phone that afternoon.
A moment later the door opened and a petite woman in sky-blue shorts and a checkered blouse tied at the ends and revealing a tan abdomen appeared. She had short chestnut brown hair, a nose spattered with freckles and a complexion that said life in Florida agreed with her. She was probably near Wolak’s age but seemed a bit younger.
“Mrs. Wolak?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Wade Parker. I spoke to you earlier on the phone?”
“Oh, yes.” She broke into a warm smile of straight pearly white teeth and opened the screen.
Much more welcoming than she’d been on the phone when he’d invited himself here.
“Felix just got back,” she said. “I told him about your call and he’s more than happy to speak with you, Mr. Parker. Please, come in.”
Hence the change in her attitude. “Thank you.”
Stepping inside he heard, as well as smelled, fish frying. “I don’t mean to interrupt your dinner.”
“It’s all right. Why don’t you join us? We’d like some company.” She turned and padded down a short hall in her flip-flops.
Parker followed her into a small, homespun kitchen filled with butterfly decorations on the walls.
“Our dinner guest has arrived,” Emily announced to the man in an apron tending an iron skillet filled with fish on the stove.
The man handed the fork to his wife, wiped his hand on a towel and held it out. “Mr. Parker?”
Parker stepped forward to shake it. “Yes. And you must be Director Novak’s friend, Felix Wolak.”
“In the flesh.”
He had the same raspy voice the director had. He stood a little shorter than Parker but he had a husky build and broad shoulders that would make you think twice before you crossed him. A build and demeanor that no doubt served him well for so many years of keeping violent criminals in line.
His straight iron gray hair had grown a little long in the back for regulation and a pair of thick black brows gave him a tough cop look. Like his wife, his skin was tan, but it had a leathery look and was darker. A fisherman’s tan. Under the a
pron he wore a gray sleeveless tank top, beige cargo shorts, and flip flops.
Part of the uniform here, Parker imagined.
“So you’ve come to me about a case you’re working?”
“I have.”
Wolak gave a quick nod as he turned and picked up a platter of French fries. “Let’s have dinner first. I’m starving and I don’t like to talk shop in front of the wife.”
In response to that remark, as he plodded toward the table Emily gave him a playful snap of her towel.
Chapter Forty-Nine
The dinner was simple. Salad, homemade fries, hush puppies, and some of the freshest bass Parker had ever tasted.
Respecting his host’s wishes, Parker didn’t mention the case while they were eating but as soon as the meal was done and Emily began clearing the dishes away, he was glad when Wolak gestured toward a hallway and led him into a cozy little living room with a homespun decor.
Wolak settled into a recliner while Parker took a seat on the brown leather couch beside it.
“Are you a smoker, Mr. Parker?” the man asked in his husky voice.
“I can’t say that I am.”
From a small drawer in a side table, Wolak took out a pipe with a polished walnut bowl, an amber colored tray, a gold foil pouch and matches. “Do you mind?”
Parker didn’t care for smoking. But it was always best for people to feel comfortable when you wanted information from them, so he didn’t protest.
“Not at all,” he said.
Wolak packed tobacco from the pouch into the pipe’s bowl and lit it with a wooden match. After a moment, the air filled with a spicy scent. “I have some Royales if you’d like to change your mind and indulge.”
A brand of cigars his father occasionally smoked. Parker shook his head. “No, thank you.”
Wolak took a drag, let out a long wisp of smoke then gave Parker a sly wink. “The wife hates this thing. Says smoking is of the devil. But I only do it when I want to think.” He folded his hands over his stomach and rocked back and forth.
Parker waited patiently hoping his host wouldn’t fall asleep.
At last Wolak took the pipe out of his mouth. “So tell me about this case of yours.”
Trial by Fire (A Miranda and Parker Mystery Book 6) Page 20
